


Lighten Your Burdens

by cuteloops



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Aren't these kids just the sweetest?, Coming of Age, Fluff and Angst, Fluff and Hurt/Comfort, Menstruation, Nightmares, Panic Attacks, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, supportive best friends
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-12
Updated: 2017-11-12
Packaged: 2019-02-01 13:17:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,087
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12705771
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cuteloops/pseuds/cuteloops
Summary: A cleric, a mage, and a paladin help each other through the trials associated with their trauma as well as new problems that growing up brings.Will / Eleven / Mike - centric, but a few cameos in here too.





	Lighten Your Burdens

#### Will

He still has episodes.

They’re not the same, of course. He’s banished his demons to the Upside Down, locked the door and thrown away the key. But they’re still there, sometimes just as much as if he was coughing them up into his bathroom sink. He can still feel those cold, slick tendrils curling around him, snaking up his back like icy fingers, clawing at a place just behind his eyeballs...

“Will?”

He jumps at the touch. A warm hand on his shoulder, now, and a set of dark eyes staring back at him. “This is the boy’s bathroom, El. You’ll get in trouble.”

“You missed lunch,” she murmurs. She squeezes his shoulder gently.

Will’s breathing is shallow, his chest tight. “El, I-” He stops, unable to spit out words. He lets out a soft whimper instead. He squints his eyes shut.

She tries to think back, to remember what Mike had done last time. “Don’t worry Will, it won’t last forever. C’mon buddy, breathe with me,” Mike had said. “That’s it, good. There’s nothing to be afraid of. I’m not going anywhere. We’re not going anywhere.”

She rubs her hand over Will’s back in large circles. “Breathe, Will,” she tells him. “We can breathe together.” She takes an exaggerated deep breath, filling up her lungs. She breathes out. In again. This time he joins her. In, 2, 3, out, 2, 3. She’s steady, gentle but firm. His breathing evens out after a few rounds of deep respirations, and he leans against her.

“I’m here,” she says.

And she stays. She doesn’t go anywhere. “I don’t want to go back to class,” he tells her at last.

“Then let’s go home.”

Eleven stands, then reaches for his hand, pulling him up. When she wraps her arms around him, he almost buckles.

Will knows Mike will be in Pre-Algebra, so they walk together to the east wing of the building. He’s hunched over his textbook, tapping on his desk with his pencil as he tries to work out a particularly difficult problem.

The pencil hits the floor.

He picks it up, then returns to the textbook.

The pencil hits the floor. Again.

He shoves the textbook into his bookbag, then slings the bag over his shoulder. Before he leaves, he stops at the teacher’s desk and mumbles something about a stomachache and visiting the nurse.

Will and Eleven are in the hallway, resting against a row of lockers. “I thought I might find you here,” he says. Then, “What’s wrong?”

“Will doesn’t feel well. Let’s go home.”

Mike nods solemnly, draping his arm over Will’s shoulders. “I heard _Back to the Future_ is good. Should we find out?”

They make a quick stop at the video rental store, then the convenience store for snacks. (Eleven is adamant that Eggos _are too_ snacks, but Will and Mike disagree. Regardless, she picks them up along with her popcorn and chocolate.)

Finally, the three of them are situated in the Byers’ living room, Will nestled in between Mike and Eleven. By the time the credits roll, Mike and Will are practically bouncing. Eleven spent just as much time watching the two of them react to the film as she did watching the film itself.

“Can you believe - ?”

“That car - !”

“And Doc Brown was - !”

Eleven listens to them chatter, already planning their Halloween costumes. After they’ve calmed down, she asks, “Do you feel better?”

“I do,” Will says. “I think I’m managing.”

“That’s the first step to feeling actually good, right?” Mike offers. “That’s something.”

Will nods. “I think so.”

“Well,” Mike begins, “I’m starving.”

“Aren’t you always?” Eleven asks, raising her eyebrows at him.

“When’s the last time you ate?” he asks Will.

Will is quiet, staring at his shoes.

Eleven squeezes his hand, then stands to follow Mike into the kitchen. Mike winces when he opens the refrigerator door. (They never did get around to replacing the shelves that Dustin cast aside to accommodate the dead demodog.) “This is a mess,” he says, attempting to right the jars of jelly and mustard rolling around in the bottom of the unit. On second thought, he goes for the jelly again. “Do you have any peanut butter?”

Joyce Byers isn’t known for keeping her kitchen well-stocked, but it’s usually adequate. Will finds some peanut butter buried at the back of one of the cabinets, behind some oatmeal and instant pudding mix.

“Perfect,” Mike says.

“We’re out of bread,” Will informs him, opening the breadbox to expose its emptiness.

“We could make macaroni and cheese?” Mike suggests.

“No milk.”

Eleven flings the freezer door open, procuring a yellow box. “Eggos?” she suggests.

Mike and Will look at each other, the click of lightbulbs above their heads practically audible. “Peanut butter and jelly Eggos?”

“You’re a genius, El,” Mike tells her.

The three of them sit at the Byers’ kitchen table, smearing waffles with peanut butter and jelly. (It’s more difficult than one might imagine, but they manage. No one seems to mind too much.)

They don’t notice the setting sun and the cool chill creeping into the air until Joyce walks in the door, home from her closing shift. She pecks Will on the forehead, offers a greeting to the other two, and then a “Do your parents know where you are?”

“My mom has her Aerobics class tonight,” Mike tells her.

Eleven just shrugs.

“You should give him a call if you’re going to be staying much later,” Joyce suggests. “He worries about you.” She hangs up her coat and starts toward her bedroom, but stops and plants quick kisses on the heads of the other two children before she does.

Mike blushes. Eleven beams.

“I should probably go to bed soon anyway,” Will tells them.

“Should we stay?” Eleven asks.

Mike nods enthusiastically. “Yeah, we don’t mind. We can stay until you fall asleep and then I’ll walk El home.”

It’s a nice idea. In theory.

When Joyce finds all three of them curled up on Will’s bed - Mike and Eleven still in their school clothes on top of the covers - she calls their respective parents to let them know where they are, and to tell them that they’re safe.

They’re all safe.

#### Eleven

When the door to their classroom opens, Will and Mike are expecting another teacher or a tardy student, or even one of the office aides.

Not Max.

“I’m so sorry to bother, Mrs. Donahue,” she tells their American History teacher, “but Vice Principal Brooks needs to see Mike Wheeler and Will Byers right away.” She shrugs apologetically.

Mrs. Donahue, a frail woman in her eighties with poor eyesight and an even poorer attitude barely has time to react before the boys have swept their things into their bags and crossed the threshold into the hallway.

“Don’t worry,” Will tells her as they leave, offering a smile, “I copied down the homework for tomorrow.”

The two follow Max down the hall, but Mike stops and scrunches his nose when she hangs a left by the biology lab. “Hey Max, the office is that w-”

She looks at him like he’s spontaneously sprouted a second head. (Which wouldn’t even be the weirdest thing she’s seen since arriving in Hawkins.) “We’re not going to the office.”

“Where are we going then?” he asks, but the trio stops abruptly in front of the girls’ bathroom in the east wing of the building.

“I need your sweatshirt,” she says.

“What?”

“Your sweatshirt. I need it.”

“Why?”

She hesitates for a moment, then takes a deep breath. “I guess I’ll tell you. But don’t freak out, okay?”

“Whatever is going on can’t be worse than the demogorgon or the mind flayer,” he assures her. She raises her eyebrows. “I mean, it can’t be, can it?”

Max motions for the two boys to lean in, even though there isn’t anyone else in the hallway. They do. “El is having _girl problems_ ,” she says, her voice low.

“What?” Mike scrunches his nose. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“You know,” Max continues. “Her time of the month. Her Aunt Flo is visiting. She’s surfing the crimson tide.” He stares at her blankly. “Nothing?”

“She’s having her period, Mike,” Will says at last. “Remember? Like they taught us in health class in seventh grade.” He turns to Max. “Right?” She nods.

Mike blushes a furious shade of red, then buries his head in his hands. His next words are muffled.

“What?” Max asks.

“I said,” he says, finally dropping his hands, “ _that_ might be worse than the demogorgon.”

“Men are ignorant,” she grumbles. “Would you just give me your sweatshirt?”

He yanks his crewneck over his head, handing it off to her. She shoves the door to the bathroom open and storms inside, emerging moments later with a sniffling, red-eyed Eleven, Mike’s sweatshirt wrapped strategically around her waist.

“Take her back to your house or something. Nancy will know what to do.”

Mike nods.

“I have to get back to English and grab my stuff before the final bell, but I’ll see you guys tomorrow, okay?” She pulls Eleven in for a quick hug before racing back down the hall, leaving her with Mike and Will.

Will grabs her hand and squeezes, then lets it fall back to her side. “Come on, El. Let’s go.”

Nancy has a study hall where her last class of the day should be, so she’s already home when the three freshmen trudge through the front door of the Wheeler home. Mike nudges Eleven forward when they reach Nancy’s door.

“Max said she’ll know what to do,” he reminds her. The two boys practically trip over each other to get back down to the kitchen when Nancy opens the door. They sit at the table, waiting. Mike tries to work on his pre-algebra homework, but he’s struggling to focus even with Will’s help.

A figure appears in the doorway, and he looks up, expecting Eleven.

It’s Nancy.

She sits down across from the two boys.

“Did she tell you what’s going on?” Nancy asks.

“Max did,” Mike says, refusing to meet her eyes.

“Did Max tell you how to help?”

“No.”

“What should we do?” Will asks.

“Well,” she starts, “I have a hot water bottle she can borrow.” She sets it on the table, but Mike doesn’t _dare_ ask what it’ll help with. “And I gave her something for the pain.”

“It hurts?” Mike asks incredulously. The bleeding sounds bad enough on its own.

Nancy nods solemnly. “She’ll be fine. Just uncomfortable for a bit. The best thing you can do is be nice. And maybe find some chocolate. Or tea. That always helps.”

When Eleven finally does come down the stairs, she looks less distraught than she did before. She’s wearing a hand-me-down dress of Nancy’s and Mike’s sweatshirt. (The sleeves are too long for her, but she doesn’t seem to mind.)

After a long moment, Mike stands up, nearly knocking over his chair. He wraps his arms around her, burying his face in her soft curls. “Are you okay, El?”

“Yes,” she says, and she squeezes him tightly before pulling away. “Thank you.” Will hugs her next, albeit more briefly. He returns to his bookbag, digging around to find a broken but unopened candy bar in the bottom of his bag.

“Here,” he says, pressing it into her hand.

“Thanks, Will.”

“Why don’t you two head down to the basement?” Mike suggests. “I’ll be down soon.”

He starts a pot of water to boil on the stove, rummages through the cabinet for a tea bag - chamomile will work, right? - and sets it gently into a teacup. Then he takes the stairs two at a time up to his room to grab the softest blanket he owns. He comes back down and dumps most of the now-boiling water into the hot water bottle. The rest is poured into the prepared teacup, and then he joins his friends in the basement.

Eleven and Will are already situated under the draped fabric of Mike’s blanket fort. He arranges the blanket over her shoulder and presses the hot water bottle into her hands, then settles in next to her, still balancing the cup of tea. Once she’s brought the hot water bottle to rest against her abdomen, he passes her the tea as well. She takes a sip, then sets it on the floor at her feet.

“Thanks, Mike.”

Will rubs soothing circles on the back of one hand, and Mike slips his fingers into her other. She leans her head on his shoulder, then speaks again. “Tell me about your day.”

It’s a game they play - just the three of them, for the most part. When she says it, Eleven doesn’t mean for Mike or Will to tell her about their day. She wants them to tell her something that stood out - something that made them smile or laugh.

Will speaks up first. “One of our vocabulary words in English today was _impetuous_ and it made me think of you.”

She pecks him on the cheek. “Sweet.” She winces, then tightens her grip on the hot water bottle.

“El? Are you okay?” Mike asks.

She nods, but he wraps his arm around her all the same. “Tell me about your day.”

“The best part of my day so far is being here with my two best friends,” he says, and he leans his head to rest atop hers.

And Eleven whispers back, “mine too.”

#### Mike

When Will and Eleven had asked the police chief if they could use the abandoned cabin for their late-night hangouts, he had specifically instituted a No-Mike-Wheeler-in-Bed-With-His-Daughter rule.

He swears it’s just another one of his “Don’t Be Stupid” rules.

Mike and Will typically sleep on the couch in the living room with the door to Eleven’s door open so the three can keep chatting until they fell asleep while still technically abiding by all of the guidelines.

Tonight, Will and Eleven fall asleep before Mike does. He tosses and turns on the couch, feeling like that Princess from the fairy tale his little sister is currently obsessed with.

When he does fall asleep, it’s not for long.

He sees Eleven in the classroom, looking at him mournfully, her nose bleeding. He sees Will’s bike, abandoned on Mirkwood. He sees Eleven wandering through the Upside Down, hears her calling his name but he can’t call back

Is this what it felt like?

He sees Will again, but this time a demogorgon is hunched over him, tearing his throat out in the twisted replica of Castle Byers. He sees other things, too.

Bob, not twenty feet from safety.

Barb, abandoned somewhere beyond the gate.

All of his friends, wrapped in the tentacles of the mind flayer.

He wakes up in a cold sweat, his curls plastered to his forehead and his cheeks slick with tears.

“El?” he calls, but Will is up first.

“Mike?” he asks, and before Mike knows it his best friend is sitting next to him rubbing his back.

A light clicks on in El’s room and she pads across the wood floor, kneeling in front of the couch.

“What’s wrong?” she asks. She reaches out, brushes a hand over his cheek.

“Nightmare,” he says, dropping his head into his hands. “It was just a nightmare.”

Gently, she pries his hands away from his face. “We’re here, Mike.”

“Go back to bed. I’ll be fine.”

“You’re shaking,” she murmurs, and she sits on his other side. “Do you want to talk about it?”

“No. I just… I just want to go back to sleep.”

“Okay,” she says, and she stands slowly. Will gives Mike’s shoulder one last squeeze, then moves away. Instead of flopping back down onto the armchair he was occupying, he follows Eleven into her room and shuts the door behind him.

“What should we do?” he asks.

“I don’t know,” she says, biting her lip. “He said he wants to sleep. Why would he lie? Friends don’t lie.”

“Sometimes they do,” Will tells her, “if they’re trying to protect each other.”

Eleven’s eyes widen with realization. “Oh. He doesn’t want us to worry.”

Will nods. Eleven glances at her bed. It’s small, sure, but it could probably fit the three teenagers with no problem.

“I was thinking the same thing,” he says. “But Hopper-”  
“Don’t worry about him,” she says. “It’s a ‘special circumstance’.” Will turns to open her door, but Eleven grabs his wrist. “Has this happened before?” she asks.

“I don’t know.” It’s an honest answer. To Will’s knowledge, Mike doesn’t have nightmares. Not like he or Eleven does anyway.

But now he’s starting to second-guess. Maybe Mike has just been conveniently omitting that information. Friends don’t lie, but Mike seems to be avoiding any line of questioning about the deep bags under his eyes as of late.

When the two of them open up the door to the living room, Mike is staring up at the ceiling, wide awake.

“Goodnight, El. Goodnight, Will,” he says. He sits up, agitated, when neither of them moves. “Are you guys just going to stand there or what? I’m trying to sleep.”

“Come on, Mike,” Will says.

“My bed is more comfortable,” Eleven offers.

“El, you know I’m not allowed to… screw it,” he says, and he’s at the door in a fraction of a second, throwing his arms around his two best friends and holding them close.

Eleven breaks away at last, leading him to the bed. When they finally get situated, it’s a bit cramped, but she can’t imagine anything more perfect. Will and Mike both close their eyes, and she watches as they soften like butter, the tension leaving their bodies. Will starts to snore softly.

“El?” Mike murmurs at last.

“I thought you were asleep,” she whispers.

“Close.”

“Sleep, Mike.”

“If this is a dream,” he mumbles sleepily, “if this is a dream…”

“I don’t want to wake up either.”

\----

Hopper finds the three of them in a tangle of limbs, Eleven’s arm tossed out over Mike’s chest, Will half-falling off the bed and Mike’s long legs dangling off the end of it. He sees it, of course, this blatant violation of his “Don’t Be Stupid” rule, but he’ll pretend he didn’t. He’s sure there’s a very good reason for the two boys in his daughter’s bed. It’s easier to ignore for now.

Rules are meant to be broken, after all.

And besides, they just look so damn peaceful.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! 
> 
> The title of this work comes from a Dickens quote: "No one is useless in this world who lightens the burdens of another". 
> 
> I don't know if anyone will enjoy this, but I had fun writing it. I just want my kids to be happy and supportive of each other! Anyway, if you even crack a smile that's an added bonus. Comments are appreciated! I live for feedback!


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